Tag: music

Amanda Palmer has a great post up regarding the discovery of art in everyday existence. i used to think that being a street performer (i was a living statue for five years….i should really write a book about it) was the ultimate act of art, because NOBODY would ever recognize my art in any way that was acceptable, nobody would…

Last Christmas, I made the foolish mistake of packing my Deluxe Edition copy of The Downward Spiral on a trip. It was stolen, along with two other CD’s: another NIN, and a Yoko Kanno — both vexing losses, but the loss of DEDS was especially sad because it was a birthday gift from Troy, who always gives the best. (Oh,…

Willie K. is a native Hawaiian performer of no small popularity, and he is also my favourite carol singer (next to Frank Sinatra). Please to enjoy his rendition of “O Holy Night,” which I look forward to all year: Willie K’s version is also called Po Hemolele, and I probably know it better than I do the actual version (which,…

Today, BoingBoing reminded me that John Lennon died 28 years ago today. Since my first national sale was a story involving Mr. Lennon, I thought I would excerpt some here: He turned to face me, and it felt like being cut off at the knees. Suddenly, I understood my mother’s Beatlemania in a completely new way. She had once confessed…

Tomorrow, I will be in Texas with some (a tiny fraction) of my American family. Doubtless we’ll be asked what we’re thankful for, so I figure I should warm up. I’m thankful for this video: This song is perfect for writing about multi-generational post-Singularity blood feuds. Also I’m fairly sure that it’s topical for a lot of you around Thanksgiving.…

There’s something magic about watching rotten, rusty barns and roll by and eating nigh-frozen sushi while listening to this song. (It’s even better after the snow has been and gone.) This is my favourite of all the things written this weekend: “Don’t you ma’am me, mister. I’m only seven years old.” “Hey, in cat years, you’d be menopausal.” He leaned…

UCSB study finds physical strength, fighting ability revealed in human faces Subjects were asked to rank the physical strength or fighting ability of the people in the photographs on a scale of one to seven. When the photographs depicted men whose strength had been measured precisely on weight-lifting machines, the researchers found an almost perfect correlation between perceptions of fighting…

Madeline Ashby…

She has worked with Intel Labs, the Institute for the Future, SciFutures, Nesta, Data & Society, The Atlantic Council, the ASU Center for Science and the Imagination, Changeist, and others. Her essays have appeared at BoingBoing, io9, WorldChanging, Creators Project, Arcfinity, MISC Magazine, and FutureNow. She is the author of the Machine Dynasty novels. Her novel Company Town was a Canada Reads finalist.